Hydraulic installations comprising a turbine and a pump



Aug. 22, 1961 A. CULAUD 2,996,995

HYDRAULIC INSTALLATIONS COMPRISING A TURBINE AND A PUMP Filed Feb. 19, 1958 2 Sheets-Sheet 1 Fig.1

INVENTOR ANDRE CULAUD wi/mgz ATTORNEY A. CULAUD Aug. 22, 1961 HYDRAULIC INSTALLATIONS COMPRISING A TURBINE AND A PUMP Filed Feb. 19, 1958 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 Ti gzb INVENTOR ANDRE CULAUD ATTORNEY United States Patent 2,996,995 HYDRAULIC INSTALLATIONS CONERISING A TURBINE AND A PUMP Andr Culaud, Geneva, Switzerland, assignor to Ateliers des Charmilles S.A., Geneva, Switzerland, a corporation of Switzerland Filed Feb. 19, 1958, Ser. No. 716,199 Claims priority, application Switzerland Feb. 27, 1957 2 Claims. (Cl. 103-97) The present invention has for its subject an hydraulic installation of the type comprising a turbine and a pump, the turbine wheel and the pump wheel being mounted on the same shaft.

In a general manner, in the installations comprising a turbine and a pump, each of said machines is studied and constructed for itself. The turbine is coupled to an alternator, for example, that driving the pump through the medium of a disengageable coupling. This arrangement involves a particularly cumbrous construction and consequently burdensome and consequently onerous, both as regards the expense of the civil engineering and that of the mechanical equipment.

Some hydraulic installations are equipped with groups having wheels conceived for functioning both as a pump and a turbine. This solution may appear seductive at the first instant, but it has the disadvantage of meeting certain difliculties of a hydraulic and mechanical nature.

The hydralic installation according to the invention, which thus comprises a turbine and a pump, is characterised in that it comprises one and the same receiver or common volute fluid chamber for the turbine and the pump, means enabling the internal space of the receiver to be separated from the space in which the turbine rotates, and the space respectively in which the pump rotates. This construction according to the invention thus allows of conserving the optimum hydraulic characteristics, either of the turbine or of the pump, whilst obtaining a reduced overall size of the installation. In fact, each hydraulic profile of the turbine or of the pump may be considered for itself. On the other hand, the omission of some members, such as a receiver, a guard sluice, a disengageable coupling device which is always a delicate member and one or two bearings, according to the arrangement envisaged, allows of reducing particularly the crowding of the group, as also the general cost of the installation.

One form of construction of the installation according to the invention is shown diagrammatically and by way of example in the accompanying drawings, wherein:

FIG. 1 is a view in axial section of said installation.

FIG. 2a is a section on the line IIII of FIG. 1, shown to a smaller scale.

FIG. 2b is a section on the line IIIIII of FIG. 1, also to a smaller scale.

Said hydraulic installation comprises a shaft 1 carried by bearings, not shown, and to one end of which are secured side by side a turbine wheel 2 and a pump wheel 3. In fact, said two Wheels 2 and 3 are clamped on to the end of shaft 1 between a shoulder 4 of said shaft and a nut 5 screwed on an extension 6 of said shaft 1. A part 7, which may be considered as forming the upper base of the turbine, is interposed between the wheels 2 and 3. Said turbine comprises in the usual manner a lower base 8 and a distributor formed by a series of movable blades 9. Said blades 9 are carried by shafts 10 of which the end 11 turns in a bearing 12 provided in the intermediate part 7, whilst the other end of the shart 10 turns in a bearing 13 secured to the lower base 8 of the turbine. Arms 14 are secured to the ends of the shafts 10 and connected by rods 15 in the known manner to a ice regulating ring 16 in order to enable the angular position of all the blades 9 to be adjusted simultaneously.

The turbine comprises a series of cross bars 17 located between the intermediate part 7 and a part 18. The passages formed between the parts 7 and 18, as also between each pair of adjacent cross bars 17, are supplied with water from a spiral received or inlet chamber or common volute fluid chamber 19".

As regards the pump 3, its diffuser 20 is formed between this intermediate part 7 and a part 21 connected to the same spiral receiver or common volute fluid chamber 19. This receiver or common volute fluid chamber 19 is therefore definitely common to the pump and to the turbine. A ring sluice valve 22 is located in a seating 23 provided between said part 21 and a stationary part 24 forming the stationary framework of the pump. The seat of said ring sluice valve 22 is constituted by a part 25 carried by the intermediate part 7. The diffuser 20 of the pump also comprises a series of cross bars 26 located between the parts 7 and 21.

As will be seen in FIG. 2a, the cross bars 17 of the front distributor of the turbine are curved so as to provoke a reversal of direction of the component tangential of the flow of water at its inlet into the turbine. As regards the cross bars 26 of the diffuser 20 of the pump, they are of classical arrangements, as shown in FIG. 2b.

This particular arrangement of the cross bars 17 and 26 is provided to permit of an identical direction of rotation for the operation of the turbine and for the operation of the pump.

For reasons of rigidity in construction and for facility, the cross bars 26, as also the cross bars 17 are partially superposed. This superposition has been indicated in FIG. 2a, in which the tracing of the cross bars 26 is shown in dotted lines conjointly with the tracing of the cross bars 17.

The operation of the installation shown in the accompanying drawings is as follows:

When the group functions as a turbine, the spiral receiver or common volute fluid chamber 19 is supplied with water, for example from a pipe under pressure, the ring sluice valve 22 being in the closed position, that is to say disposed transversely to the outlet passage from the pump wheel 3, in such a manner as to separate the internal space of the receiver from the space 27 in which the wheel of the pump 3 turns. The water entering the spiral receiver or common volute fluid chamber 19 engages between the cross bars 17, in which the tangential component of flow is reversed. The latter is further controlled by movable directing blades 9 directing the water threads on to the turbine wheel 2. During the operation of the turbine, the water contained in the space 27 is eliminated, for example by means of compressed air, in such a manner as to uncover the wheel 3. On the contrary, when the installation is to operate as a pump, the movable directing blades 9 are brought into the closing position in such a manner as to separate the internal space of the receiver or common volute fluid chamber 19 from the space 28 in which the turbine wheel 2 rotates. The ring sluice valve 22 is moved into the open position, as shown in FIG. 1, and the water contained in the space 28 is removed, for example by means of compressed air, in such a manner as to uncover the turbine wheel 2. The generator which normally supplies current when the installation operates as a turbine, is supplied, in this latter case, with current so as to operate as a motor and thus drive the shaft 1 and the wheels 2 and 3.

The pump 3 discharges into its diffuser 2t and into the receiver or common volute fluid chamber '19 the water which is to be conducted to a higher level. The water discharged from the pump may therefore be directed directly into the pipe under pressure branched to the spiral receiver or common volute fluid chamber 19 so as to be again passed into a collecting tank, or damming reservoir, for example.

The foregoing description shows the great simplicity in construction and exploitation of an hydraulic installation of this character adapted to operate as a turbine, or as a pump, with the same direction of rotation for its two systems of operation.

Iclaim:

1. A hydraulic installation comprising, in combination, a turbine having an internal space and a pump having an internal space, the said turbine including a turbine wheel in said turbine internal space and said pump including a pump wheel in said pump internal space, a single shaft, said turbine wheel and said pump wheel being mounted in side-by-side relationship on said single shaft, a volume fluid chamber common to both said turbine and said pump, said turbine having therein a front distributor, said pump having therein a diffuser, said volute fluid chamber being operatively directly connected to both said turbine, including said turbine internal space, and said pump, including said pump internal space, at the front distributor and the diffuser, respectively, said front distributor including means for enabling said volute fluid chamber to be operatively disconnected from said turbine internal space, said means including movable directing blades, means for enabling said volute fluid chamber to be operatively disconnected from said pump internal space, and a plurality of curved cross bar means for causing a reversal of a tangential component of the flow of water at the front distributor of said turbine, said cross bar means being positioned between said movable directing blades and said volute fluid chamber, whereby there will be an identical direction of rotation both for the operation of the turbine and for the operation of the pump.

2. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein said means for enabling said volute fluid chamber to be operatively disconnected from said pump internal space includes a ring sluice valve, said ring sluice valve being positioned in said diffuser.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,322,810 Moody Nov. 25, 1919 2,205,747 Klauss June 25, 1940 2,687,280 Sharp Aug. 24, 1954 2,801,043 Spotz et a1. July 30, 1957 FOREIGN PATENTS 600,273 Germany May 11, 1932 

